FURTHER TALES OF JAN, DEAN AND BOB

Bob GreeneCHICAGO TRIBUNE

Jan was alleged to be sleeping, but Dean was hungry, so we all agreed to meet for cheeseburgers at the place across the highway from our motel. The place, we could see from a sign in front, was called Mr. Lucky`s.

Mr. Lucky`s, it turned out, was a pool hall. To be more specific, it was a pool hall and bar. It was a pool hall and bar of the sort that features darkened windows so that people outside the building cannot look in and observe what is going on inside the building. At lunchtime today, what was going on inside the building was a lingerie show.

This was a lingerie show of a variety you will not find on the high-fashion runways of Paris or Milan. Dean studied his menu, knowing that he still had a good six hours before he would be on stage at the Tulsa State Fair. The rest of the band evaluated the lingerie show. No one at our table had entered the premises desiring anything racier than a cheeseburger. Well, maybe some fries and a Coors.

''Hey. Surfer Man,'' the master of ceremonies at Mr. Lucky`s said to David Logeman, the drummer for Jan and Dean. ''Jackie here`s got something she wants to talk to you about.''

Jackie was one of the lingerie models. This had all the signs of developing into a fairly unrefined afternoon. The only saving grace was that no one in our party had really planned it. Dean adjusted his reading glasses and did not look up from the menu.

Oh, well. I suppose I could have been perusing the position papers of the three presidential candidates. But the Jan and Dean engagement for the next two nights called for four separate shows at the fair-6:30 p.m. show, 9 p.m. show-and when duty calls, a responsible band member shows up. Besides, you can think just as diligently about the national deficit and the balance of trade agreement at Mr. Lucky`s as you can at the Library of Congress.

This new avocation was threatening to take over my life. Even friends and colleagues had been doubting my veracity when I told them about singing background vocals with Jan and Dean, but I was taking my new part-time job very seriously. ''Surf City,'' ''Little Old Lady From Pasadena,'' ''Surfin`

U.S.A.,'' ''409,'' ''Help Me Rhonda''-I had grown up with the surf/rock/cars/ girls music of Jan and Dean and their California contemporaries from the 1960s, the Beach Boys, and now that I had obtained this opportunity, I did not want to be found lacking.

We managed to leave Mr. Lucky`s with our dignity pretty much intact. On stage that night, during the first show, Dean introduced the band members. I cringed inwardly while waiting for him to get to me-he has yet to give me a straight introduction-and on this night he gestured in my direction and said, ''Ladies and gentlemen, will you please welcome a very special guest on stage with us tonight-Roy Orbison`s cousin.'' As the audience applauded warmly, Dean said, ''Well, he`s really Roy Orbison`s cousin`s gardener.''

It was a fine performance. October is late in the year for a fair, and outside the arena the temperature on the fairgrounds midway was chilly and the Oklahoma night wind was up. Jan and Dean are a summer band-they have been since the beginning, more than 30 years ago, back before ''Surf City'' went to No. 1 in 1963, back before Jan`s terrible automobile accident in 1966-and with summer ending, these four shows in Tulsa would be pretty much it for them until next spring. They travel the country when the sun is shining, and what they are selling to their audiences is happiness and an hour or so each night of comfort and joyous memories. All jokes aside, I value being a part of this; I look at the faces in the audience and the gift goes both ways.

After the first show, before we headed out onto the midway to look for dinner, a man in the audience stopped me. Apparently Dean hadn`t enunciated my introduction very clearly; this man from the audience said to me, ''You guys put on a real good show. Your name`s Gardner, right?''

Yep, it is. No more ''Surf City'' this year; no more Jan and Dean music until winter has come and gone. Jan Berry is 51; Dean Torrence is 52; the music, though, is forever young, and when the warmth of an American spring breaks through in April or May, the music will be back, and so will the men who sing it. I`m hoping to be back, too. The world can be a frigid place, but certain songs provide a glow that`s stronger and longer than a summer`s night. The glow is just that warm and just that great. It really is, or my name`s not Gardner Orbison.